_queenly thoughts_, and that is the great thing."



A SWARM OF WILD BEES

By Albert W. Tolman

"How many bridges have I driven rivets on?" repeated the watchman,
reflectively. "Let me see--just forty-seven--no, forty-eight! I
forgot the Mogung cantilever. Never in Burma were you? Well, it's
the only time I ever went abroad. It was something of a compliment
for a young fellow of twenty-two to be sent on his company's first
job abroad. I should have liked the trip first rate if Harry Lancy
hadn't been going as foreman.

"Harry had risen from the ranks, and at twenty-five was considered
one of the company's best men. I'd never worked under him; but I
judged he'd be uppish and arbitrary, and knew I shouldn't like him.
You notice such things when you've just come of age. As you get
older, you begin to think less of your own feelings, and more of
doing your work right.

"We landed at Rangoon about May 1st, went by rail to Mandalay, and
from there travelled slowly up-country by construction-train to the
Mogung Gorge. During the whole journey I didn't speak a hundred
words to Lancy. Still, I don't think he suspected I had any grudge
against him. If he did, he never let on, but treated me just like
the others.